Since 1986, the Burke Museum has been saving tissue specimens from birds and mammals for use in molecular research. This collection is now one of the largest of its type in the world.

The Genetic Resource Collection at the Burke Museum is essentially a "library" of biodiversity—and one of the most important in the world for birds. The Burke's GRC and the few others like it are the only places where tissues of a wide variety of animals are being systematically collected and stored in archival conditions for future research: they contain frozen tissues from thousands of species that would otherwise not be available to scientists. The importance of such collections is increasing rapidly as habitats and organisms face destructive pressure in the wild, and as scientists discover the rich array of biological information available from well-preserved tissues. The Burke GRC loans sub-samples of these tissues to researchers for molecular studies, which often involve analysis of DNA or proteins. See our Tissue Policy for more details and loan conditions. Staff and students are affiliated with UW's Biology Department.

Because the Burke GRC is historically unique, it is irreplaceable. For example, it contains hundreds of samples salvaged with from the 1998 Exxon Valdez oil spill and from North Pacific fishing industries. To build a similar collection from scratch would take several million dollars and decades of work. Thus, the GRC is a priceless resource and especially important to the UW community given its emphasis on biotechnology and molecular biology. (Photo of Black-footed Albatross, Phoebastria nigripes, by Dennis Paulson.)